This disclosure relates generally to online systems, and more specifically to presenting content to users of an online system.
Online systems, such as social networking systems, allow users to connect to and to communicate with other users of the online system. Users may create profiles on an online system that are tied to their identities and include information about the users, such as interests and demographic information. The users may be individuals or entities, such as corporations or charities. Online systems allow users to easily communicate and share content with other online system users by providing content to an online system for presentation to other users. Content provided to an online system by a user may be declarative information provided by a user, status updates, check-ins to locations, images, photographs, videos, text data, or any other information a user wishes to share with additional users of the online system. An online system may also generate content for presentation to a user, such as content describing actions taken by other users on the online system.
Additionally, many online systems commonly allow users (e.g., businesses) to sponsor presentation of content on an online system to gain public attention for a user's products or services or to persuade other users to take an action regarding the user's products or services. Content for which the online system receives compensation in exchange for presenting to users is referred to as “sponsored content.” Many online systems receive compensation from a user for presenting other online system users with certain types of sponsored content provided by the user. Frequently, online systems charge a user for each presentation of sponsored content to an online system user or for each interaction with sponsored content by an online system user. For example, an online system receives compensation from a user each time a content item provided by the user is displayed to another user on the online system, each time another user interacts with a content item from the user presented by the online system (e.g., selects a link included in the content item), or each time another user performs another action after being presented with the content item (e.g., visits a physical location associated with the user who provided the content item to the online system).
Content items may be associated with targeting criteria that identify characteristics of online system users eligible to be presented with the content item. For example, a content item is eligible to be presented to an online system user having characteristics satisfying at least a threshold amount of targeting criteria associated with the content item; however, the content item is not eligible to be presented to another online system user having characteristics satisfying less than the threshold amount of targeting criteria associated with the content item. Targeting criteria associated with a content item are often specified by a user providing the content item to an online system. For example, content items describing a particular restaurant are associated with targeting criteria identifying a threshold frequency of checking-in to the restaurant or to similar restaurants via the online system, profile information maintained by the online system including dining out as an interest or hobby, and indicating a preference for a page about the restaurant on the online system. Hence, targeting criteria associated with a content item allows an online system to identify users who are most likely to be interested in being presented with a particular content item as eligible be presented with the content item.
Some content items may be more relevant to some users than to other users based on physical locations associated with the users. For example, content items describing a particular restaurant in the city of San Francisco are more likely to be relevant to users who frequently visit the area where the restaurant is located or who are current or former residents of San Francisco than to users who are not associated with the area or with the city. Hence, targeting criteria associated with content items often identify a threshold distance from a physical location associated with the content items to identify users associated with a location within the threshold distance of the content items as eligible to be presented with the content items on the online system. Therefore, targeting criteria associated with content items describing the restaurant in the previous example may specify a threshold distance from the physical location of the restaurant for a current location of online system users or for another location associated with online system users.
Conventional online systems do not identify users associated with locations greater than a threshold distance of a physical location specified by targeting criteria associated with a content item as eligible to be presented with the content item. However, some users associated with locations that do not satisfy targeting criteria associated with the content item are interested in being presented with the content item. For example, the online system does not identify a user living in San Francisco as eligible to be presented with a content item associated with a restaurant if a location associated with the user is not within a threshold distance of the location of the restaurant specified by targeting criteria associated with the content item, even though the user may have an interest in the restaurant. Accordingly, targeting criteria including location information may inadvertently prevent presentation of content items associated with the targeting criteria from users who would be interested in being presented with the content items. Although online systems may attempt to identify users who would be interested in receiving content items associated targeting criteria identifying physical locations but who are not associated with locations satisfying the targeting criteria, identifying such users involves additional time when selecting content items for to users, which may decrease user interaction with the online system.